Willy Loman in the Age of Social Media

Attention Must Be Paid to Willy Loman

The stunning new production of Death of a Salesman, now running in New York, has damning implications for today's image-obsessed culture. 

I read Arthur Miller's play in high school and took it as a distant critique of the dangers of the so-called American dream. At the time, the work did not seem to apply to my schoolmates or to me; we were headed for college and shiny futures.

Years later, in 2012, I saw the late, great Philip Seymour Hoffman as the doomed Willy Loman and found his performance brutal and definitive, an apt rendering of the playwright’s intentions. (Hoffman fatally overdosed shortly after his run in the play; there were reports that his mental health had deteriorated while he played Loman.)

Now, Broadway’s latest reimaging of Salesman lands, to quote the New York Times, “like a haymaker to the temple.”

Nathan Lane as Willy Loman

Helmed by the incomparable Nathan Lane, it shatters the audience. The woman next to me at the Winter Garden Theatre sobbed uncontrollably near the end of Act II. 

As always, the play drives us to reflect on the lies we tell ourselves, our hopes and dreams, and time’s tendency to play tricks on us and on our delusions of self-importance. 

But this Salesman also makes us think new thoughts. Willy’s misconceptions about success and his quest to be seen as well-liked and successful in an indifferent world resonate differently now. 

This time, Willy’s obsession with approval made me ponder social media's deadly capacity to deceive both ourselves and others. "Attention must be paid," cries Willy's wife, Linda. Indeed.

This Willy’s downward spiral hints at the profound cost of constructing an identity on Instagram, LinkedIn, and the like. The grind of endless image management and the toll of portraying ourselves as perfect embodiments of the new American dream of looks, luxe, and professional success often collide with cruel, unyielding realities. 

Loman's son Biff, shattered, shrieks to his toxically self-deluding father near the end of Act II, “I’m nobody.”

How many online narcissists feel that way inside? 

Today, as in 1949, when Arthur Miller’s American tragedy premiered, self-delusion can have terminal consequences.

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